


Home + Headache

by impossiblepluto



Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Gen, Headaches & Migraines, Hurt/Comfort, Parental Jack Dalton (MacGyver TV 2016), mentions of needles, mentions of vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:14:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24764464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impossiblepluto/pseuds/impossiblepluto
Summary: Mac gets a migraine. Jack is there to help.
Relationships: Jack Dalton & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)
Comments: 27
Kudos: 160





	Home + Headache

**Author's Note:**

  * For [anguishmacgyver](https://archiveofourown.org/users/anguishmacgyver/gifts).



> This started out as a prompt list request for anguishmacgyver and then I realized it would also work as the first entry for my Bad Things Happen Bingo card!
> 
> If you haven't seen "A Quiet Place" there is a spoiler for that movie.

Jack wouldn’t call himself a patient man. It’s a fault he recognizes in himself and he owns it. He’s easily frustrated by the long lines at the grocery store when all he wants to do is go home. There should be a special line for secret agents who have been shot who are just here to pick up a six pack. The heavy traffic that plagues the city he now calls home drives him insane. 

His whole life has been waiting. Til he’s old enough to compete in the rodeo. For the dragging school day to finally end and for his teachers to release him to the freedom of summer vacation. Waiting to get his driver’s license so he could - legally- borrow the farm truck.

The irony is not lost on him that since then he’s made a career of waiting.

Laying on his belly, in the elements, too hot, too cold, too rainy, too snowy, waiting on the perfect shot. Waiting for actionable intel and for command to get off their asses and issues orders. Waiting to see if it’s truly better to ask for forgiveness than permission. 

Waiting on the world’s slowest - and snarkiest - bomb nerd

And most recently and most frustrating, waiting for the world’s slowest bomb nerd to wake up. 

That is the worst kind of waiting and it never gets any easier. 

He’s sat in uncomfortable waiting room chairs and hospital recliners around the globe, back aching and watching for any sign that the kid will come back to him. 

This time, at least, he’s stretched out on the couch in Mac’s living room, pillow tucked beneath his knees, one arm behind his head. One earbud in place, listening absently to the history of the Roman Empire and the other attune to Mac in the other room, the lightest whisper of sound jars him to attention. He raises his head, listening to the faint noise of Mac struggling in his sleep. Debating getting up and waking the kid or waiting to see if he settles on his own. 

He’s just decided to go check when he hears the bedroom door creaks open. Soft footsteps pad down the hallways and a moment later Mac appears at the threshold of the living room. Face pale and hair mussed with sleep and sweat. One leg of his sweatpants is bunched around his knee, revealing bare feet. 

“Hey, look who’s up,” Jack murmurs, moving to a sitting position. 

Mac squints, pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes. His voice rough with sleep. “You didn’t have to stay.”

“Your couch is nicer.” Jack stands, stretching, and drawing the shades across the window, blocking out the afternoon sun. “Wasn’t expecting to see you for a while yet.”

Mac sighs in relief at the darkened room. He runs a hand through his hair, an unsuccessful attempt to smooth the cowlick. 

“You feeling any better?” Jack keeps his voice soft, stepping cautiously across the room. Stopping just out of arm's reach from Mac and resisting the urge to add his hands to the mess of Mac’s hair, brushing it from his eyes. 

He knows, from unfortunate experience, how unbearable Mac finds touch when he’s like this. The shirt he’s wearing is extra baggy and the softest Jack’s ever felt and sometimes even that is enough to make Mac whimper in distress.

He’s seen this all before. A dozen times at least and Jack still missed all the warning signs. 

Maybe not so much missed as he was deliberately misled. 

And Jack raises an eyebrow, assessing Mac. Easily seeing now what he somehow missed before. The slight unsteady waver from vertigo. The strain around his mouth, and the tension he’s holding in his shoulders from a stretch of too many missions. Too many days that bled and blended in a continuous stream of jetlag. In too many towns planted along the equator and even Jack with his Texas upbringing was feeling the effects of fatigue and the prolonged heat exposure. 

It reminded him of the often sixteen-hour days they put in while downrange. Dusty and dry. Too hot to eat and too hot to sleep. 

Cranky, exhausted, and flat out irritable. 

Mac was curled on the couch in the plane, his usual spot which didn’t raise any warning flags in Jack’s mind. They were a few hours from home and Jack too, was having trouble keeping his eyes open. He couldn’t wait for a long shower, a good meal, and his bed - if he could eat while he showered he’d save time in getting to his bed quicker - when Matty’s voice startled them awake.

And she can glare at him from now until the end of time, he was not the only person who groaned when they saw her face on the screen. 

They were diverted for one more quick mission, a little favor and they’d be home by lunchtime in LA, which proves that they’ve been on the go much too long because Jack’s internal clock screams that he’s missing at least a few hours or possibly a few days somewhere. 

He should have protested, but when he looked over at Mac, the kid squared his sagging shoulders and ever the Team Leader, sat up and accepted the mission, leading by example. And since he would be doing most of the work, if Mac could find the reserves to keep going so could Jack. 

Now, Jack wishes he’d paid more attention to those exhausted blue eyes and pale face. That he’d recognized this was Mac being a good little soldier and pushing himself well past his reserves. 

He should have pushed Mac to drink something. Eat something. Should have told Matty that even though it would only be a few more hours, they couldn’t possibly take on another mission. Mac had nothing left to give. 

Instead, Jack followed his boy and crawled into the access tunnel deep under the city, teasing Mac that they would find an underground village of mole-people chewing through the power cables. He should have noticed that Mac didn’t rise to the bait. Ignored the chance to expound he knowledge of underground cities, temples, and fallout bunkers around the globe. 

But as soon as they hopped off the ladder in the tunnel, the mineral-rich soil wreaked havoc with their earbuds. A piercing squelch had Mac clawing at his ear with a gasp of pain, flinching away from the high-pitched buzzing. 

“Here,” he shoved the offending comm into Jack’s hands, his brow furrowed and his mouth pressed into a firm line. 

“You okay?” Jack pulled his own earbud out, pocketing them both to silence the skull-piercing shrill as he turned a concerned eye on Mac. 

Mac rubbed his ear and waved Jack away. “Yeah, just take it above ground, would ya?”

“You’re acting like your head’s about to explode like you’re a monster from A Quiet Place.”

“It’s loud.” Mac rolled his eyes and turned away, hiding a grimace. “For the first time, I have sympathy for the monsters.”

“Don’t get crazy, it ain’t that loud.” 

“For those of us without presbycusis, it is,” Mac muttered.

Jack grumbled on his way back up the ladder, acting as a liaison between Mac and the above-ground world. “Thinks he’s so smart with his fancy word for hearing loss. Age-related. Age. As if, even if I did have hearing loss it would be because of that and not the years of explosions he’s set off next to my head.”

Mac only grunted in response to his on-going and frankly, increasingly hilarious if he does say so himself, puns and complaints. Which at the time, he chalked up to Mac being focus on his task, because somehow, the world’s slowest bomb nerd managed to finish in record time. 

When he emerged from the tunnel, Mac’s eyes slammed shut against the onslaught of sunlight. Pupils slow to adjust after hours in the dank and dark, Jack assumed.

Then he stumbled stepping off the ladder. 

“Easy, hoss,” Jack caught his shoulder, steadying him. Frowning when he felt Mac’s muscles trembling under his damp t-shirt. “You okay?” 

“Yeah. Just bright,” Mac slurred, hand protecting his eyes from the sun. 

Jack rested the back of his hand against Mac’s forehead. “Huh? You don’t feel too warm.”

“I’m not sick,” Mac muttered, pushing Jack’s hand away. “Just tired. My eyes are burning.”

“I’d buy you a nice pair of sunglasses if you’d stop taking them apart all the time.” Jack guided him toward the car, heading back to the airport to finish the last leg of their journey. “Maybe a nice pair of aviators so you can match me ‘n Ri. Plus, they’d go with your haircut and that jacket you insist on wearing. You’d look like some eighties action hero.” Jack ruffled Mac’s unruly hair as Mac batted his hand away, though he leaned more heavily into Jack’s support. 

Back on the plane, Jack dropped into his usual seat across from the couch, watching Mac sink down exhausted. He yanked his jacket off, pulling it over his head and turning his back toward the cabin, pressing his face into the cool leather. Jack could justify that action. Exhausted. Cranky and just plain ready to be home and put this long string of bad days behind them. Jack was feeling much the same way. He watched Mac for only a moment longer before his head tipped against the window and he drifted. 

It felt like less than a minute when a whimper of pain woke him. Instantly on alert, Jack’s eyes flew open just in time to see Mac lurch from the couch, staggering to the lavatory near the back of the jet.

“Mac?” Jack leapt from his seat, following his kid down the aisle. The door slammed shut and the lock clicked into place a second before the sound of retching started. 

“Mac?” Jack called softly through the door as the various pieces clicked into place. 

“Jack?” Bozer leaned over the seat. His eyes heavy and voice fatigued, roused from sleep by the surprise pounding of footsteps. 

“Think our boy’s in the middle of a migraine.” 

“A migraine?” Riley sat up, rubbing her eyes. Thinking back over the years they’ve been a team. “I didn’t know he got migraines.”

“Hasn’t in a while. At least that I know about,” Bozer said, reaching across the empty seat next to him and lowering the plastic sunshield. “But they’re bad when he does.”

“First time I saw him have one I thought he was having a stroke or a seizure or something,” Jack leaned against the seat next to the lav. He crossed his arms over his chest and scrubbed his face. “Nope. Just a migraine,” Jack laughed bitterly at the memory. A dozen klicks from the base when Mac’s eyes, which had been squinty all day slammed shut. He struggled to get the words out, yelling for Jack to stop the Humvee throwing himself into the sand and vomiting like he was in The Exorcist. Jack dragged him into the medical tent as soon as they arrived on base, despite, or maybe because of Mac’s slurred protests that he would be okay. It was “just a migraine.”

Riley exited her seat, following Bozer up the aisle, darkening the interior as much as they could. 

Jack turned back to the door. He tapped lightly. “Mac?” 

The lock slid back, granting permission and Jack opened the door. Mac on his knees, head pressed into his hands. 

Jack squatted down behind him. “You done?”

“Think so,” Mac’s voice raw. The back of his shirt damp. 

“Want to try some water?”

“No,” Mac gasped. “Don’t think I could keep it down.” 

“I’m guessing that you don’t have your meds on you.”

Mac bit his lip and shook his head. “No. At home.”

“Okay. We’re about forty minutes out. We’ll just hang on til then. You want to lay down or do ya think you need to ride that out in here?”

“Lay down, but I don’t think I can stand,” a hoarse sob tore through Mac’s throat. Jack maneuvered his arm around Mac’s back, tucking his hand under Mac’s arm and helping him rise. Mac’s face lost all remaining color as he rose. He trembled on shaky legs as Jack guided him back to the couch. One he was settled, Jack stepped back, resisting the urge to react to the pain filled whimpers, the instinctual need to provide comfort at those sounds. 

Riley grabbed an ice pack from the first aid kit and cracked it, warning Mac before positioning it on the back on his neck. 

Jack silently cursed the air traffic controllers who took their sweet time directing them to land especially when the change in cabin pressure brought fresh tears to Mac’s eyes. Curses the California sun and the LA traffic as Mac climbed into the backseat of the GTO, tucking his face into the corner and covering his head. And the distance from the airport to Mac’s house. Granddad Harry should have planned this better.

Jack pulled every shade and unplugged every electronic they passed on their way down the hall to Mac’s bedroom. 

He parked Mac on the edge of the bed. 

“Meds first,” he whispered. After making sure Mac wasn’t going to tumble, he headed to the adjoining bathroom, searching through the medicine cabinet. Finding the small navy blue case, he returned to the bedroom.

“I’m guessing you wouldn’t be able to keep the pills down,” Jack said softly, opening the case and assembling the autoinjector, snapping the cartridge into place. 

Mac groaned, covering his mouth. 

“You need a bucket?”

“Just do it.”

Jack helped Mac shrug out of his button-down and rolled up the sleeve of his t-shirt. He quickly wiped down the skin over Mac’s deltoid muscle. Applying firm pressure to distract him from the needle prick, Jack places it against his skin and depresses the plunger. Mac doesn’t even flinch at the injection, only sighs in relief when Jack pulls the device away. 

He knows it's too soon to feel a reprieve from the pain, but knowing that it’s coming helps. 

“You want to get out of those clothes?”

“Please,” Mac murmured. Jack helped him shuck his cargo pants and into a pair of soft sleep pants, before pulling the t-shirt over his head. 

His skin was clammy, and shivers tore through him. A quick search and Jack found the shirt he knew Mac has been able to stand wearing during other migraines and helped feed Mac’s arm and head through the appropriate openings. 

Jack tucked Mac between the cool sheets, and adjusted a cold cloth over his eyes. The lines of tension finally eased when his head hit the pillow. Slowly, quietly, Jack gathered the laundry and put the medkit away before easing his way from the room. Even the sound of another person breathing can put Mac on edge during a bad migraine and this is one of the worst Jack’s seen in a while. 

He made his way down the hall, avoiding the creaky floorboard, and settled on the couch for his own nap while he waited for Mac to wake. 

“You feeling any better?” Jack repeats when Mac doesn’t answer right away. His eyes scan Mac from head to bare toe. 

Mac shrugs. “Still a little…” his hand wobbles back and forth. He scans the room, looking a little befuddled and lost, the way he does after a migraine gets a stronghold and a forced nap, like he’s not sure he’s completely awake. 

“Think you can get anything down for me?”

“Suppose I should try,” Mac sighs, waffling, looking longingly towards the sofa. 

“Go sit on the couch. I’ve got ya.” Jack directs Mac further into the living room, watching him stumble to the couch before turning toward the kitchen. He putters for a minute, gathering toast, a Gatorade, and ginger ale, in case Mac’s still queasy. 

Mac’s eyes are closed when he returns to the living room. Jack hesitates for a second, wondering if he managed to fall asleep again and if he should disturb him.  


“‘M awake,” Mac cracks an eyelid looking up at Jack. He holds out his hand, accepting glass and taking a long draw of the electrolyte fueled beverages. 

"Careful there. Not too much at once. Don't want to see that in a technicolor repeat."

Mac clears his throat and takes another, smaller sip. “Thank you.”

Jack settles on the couch next to him. “Want to try something solid?”

Mac’s mouth twitches as he considers, then reaches for the toast, nibbling on the corner. Jack is pretty sure that it’s more to appease him than because Mac wants it.

“So this sprung up out of nowhere, huh?” Jack says quietly, ignoring the prick from his conscience at starting this conversation now, when Mac is still hurting. Playing on the rarely shown vulnerability. “None of the usual warnings that you used to get.”

Mac takes another bite and chews thoughtfully. 

“Cause I thought we had an agreement, that you let me know about these things. That you tell me if you’re feeling sick or you’re hurting or as soon as you feel like a migraine might be comin’ on.”

Mac swallows. “We were almost home. I thought I could make it until we got home. I would have made it, if we didn’t get that last mission.”

Jack scrubs his hand over the scruff on his chin. “So why didn’t you speak up? Tell Matty that you weren’t up for it.”

“It wasn’t a bomb or anything,” Mac shrugs, setting his plate on the coffee table. “Nothing dangerous.”

“Right. Nothing dangerous. And nothing that couldn’t have waited. Matty could have dispatched another team in a few hours but you still decided to risk your health.”

“It’s a migraine not a…” Mac’s voice breaks off, rubbing his forehead.

Jack lowers his voice. “You’re still hurtin’ hours later. There’s no reason for that. And what if it had been something dangerous. Would you have spoken up?”

“Sorry Matty, there’s a dangerous bomb that will destroy a city but I need to go home because I have a headache.”

“Security and intel, that’s my job title right?”

Mac blinks at the sudden change in the direction of the conversation.

“You trust me to keep you safe, but I can’t make decisions about security if I don’t have all the information. Maybe there will be a day where we don’t have another choice, there’s a bomb and you are the only one who can do something about it, but if you don’t tell me what’s going on with you, if you don’t tell me that you’re sick, I can’t help search for another solution. I can’t keep this team safe.” 

“I’d never put the team in jeopardy,” Mac sits up straight, eyes flashing. 

“And what about you, Mac? Are you including yourself in that? Because that’s all I’m asking. For you to include yourself in the list of people worth saving,” Jack says, meeting Mac’s eyes. He can still see the pain burning there. “Because you are to me.”

Mac blinks rapidly, eyes turning red and prickling with emotion that is mirrored on Jack’s face. 

“You’re important, Mac, and I don’t know why anyone would teach you that you aren’t.” Jack reaches out, tentatively, unsure if his touch is going to ignite a spark of pain, but Mac leans, ever so slightly into the hand on his trembling shoulder, closing his eyes. “You want another cold washcloth over your eyes?”

“But-” Mac’s eyes fly open in surprise.

“Lecture’s over, kid. For now at least. We’ll revisit this when you’re feeling better,” Jack’s thumb strokes against Mac’s shoulder. “You want to lay down?”

Mac nods, eyes slipping closed again. “Don’t leave.”

“‘Course not,” Jack says, helping Mac stretch out on the couch, his head pillowed on Jack’s leg. “Okay to touch now?”

Mac hums in approval and Jack places his hand lightly on Mac’s forehead. Thumb stroking his temple in a rhythmic motion. 

Jack watches the rise and fall of Mac’s chest as his breathing slows. “I don’t really say it. Always been more a man of action than words,” he smiles when he hears a slight huff from the half-sleeping Mac, “but I love you, kiddo.” 


End file.
